Kirklees Council's health boss has said that speeding up Covid vaccinations and increasing testing capacity can help bring the borough's rate down.

The West Yorkshire council, which covers Huddersfield and Dewsbury, has the fourth highest Covid infection rate in England with just over 72 people per 100,000 testing positive in the seven days to 15 May - up from 53 the previous week.

That increase as well as confirmed cases of the Indian Covid variant has led to the area being labelled as an "area of concern" and being selected for surge testing by the government today.

Rachel Spencer-Henshall (pictured above), strategic director for public health at Kirklees Council said: “We are submitting proposals today to work with government to bring in extra vaccination and testing capacity.

"We have positive levels of vaccine uptake in Kirklees but, by speeding up its delivery and adding more pop-up clinics where they’re needed most, we can reduce infection rates and protect local people."

Ms Spencer-Henshall said work was already going on to bring down the number of people testing positive for coronavirus in the area.

She also said that close contacts of confirmed Indian variant cases in Kirklees were undergoing PCR tests to check whether they too were positive.

Ms Spencer-Henshall added: "It’s difficult to know why our infection rate is as high as it is, but we do know how to prevent the virus from spreading because it remains the same.

"We all need to play our part so we can get Kirklees through the roadmap out of lockdown safely."

Health officials hope the event will increase public confidence in getting the vaccination.

Wednesday's figures also show that another 107 people in NI have tested positive for Covid-19.

Bolton's council leader says the town had already shown local lockdowns "don't work".

India was put on the travel ban list two weeks after Pakistan and Bangladesh.

David Pittam
BBC News Online

Surge vaccinations will be taking place in Leicester in a battle to stop the spread of the Indian Covid-19 variant, the Health Secretary has said.

Matt Hancock told MPs that 2,967 cases of the B1617.2 variant have been identified in the UK, up from 2,323 on Monday.

Bedford, Burnley, Hounslow, Kirklees and North Tyneside will also receive surge testing and extra vaccines, with Blackburn with Darwen and Bolton having already received additional support.

Leicester City Council later clarified it will not be carrying out surge testing, but will be stepping up its vaccination programme.

Cases of the Indian variant were first found in Leicester last month, although the council said the numbers are still "relatively low" compared to other parts of the country.

Image source, PA Media

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